Maybe EPA and Sen. Inhofe like “girly men”

We all remember the Saturday Night Live skit with the two comedians fleshily-padded for their body building personas mocking wimpy “girly men.” The moniker is a little less funny when you read about boy genitalia becoming feminized when moms are exposed to chemicals used in lots of common consumer plastic products.

What products and which brands? You’ll have a hard time figuring that one out.

Fear not, says Sen. James M. Inhofe, R-Okla., officials with the EPA and reps from the chemical industry. In this story from the LA Times’ Marla Cone, these folks all say that a 30-year-old toxics law is keeping Americans plenty safe, no need to cloud your heads with labeling and bans on whacky Daffy Duck lispy-sounding stuff like phthalates (the stuff in plastics).

Inhofe, chair of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, convened the hearing Tuesday to consider changes in the Toxic Substances Control Act, which regulates 82,000 chemicals including “plastic ingredients in toys, flame retardants in computers, and compounds in cosmetics, cookware and plastic baby bottles,” says Cone.

Turns out all sorts of industrial chemicals are turning up in unfortunate places — breast milk, fish and politicians, to name a few.

More from Cone:

Many political, legal, scientific and economic experts say the law needs to be overhauled because the U.S. trails the European Union and other developed countries in reviewing and restricting toxic substances.

“The EPA has slipped in its leadership in the international arena,” said Dr. Lynn R. Goldman, a Johns Hopkins University scientist and pediatrician who headed the EPA’s toxics program for the Clinton administration.

So in the meantime, it’ll be up to companies to drop these chemicals on their own, or sometimes the effect of stricter European laws carry over to U.S. products. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, for example, ran this piece on phthalates in nail polishes. Estee Lauder has stopped using the chemical, but OPI and Sally Hansen have not.